


Error: Reboot Required

by Rouxyn



Category: VIXX
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-30
Updated: 2017-04-30
Packaged: 2018-10-25 21:03:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10772385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rouxyn/pseuds/Rouxyn
Summary: When Wonshik suffered a fatal accident, I used my skills as a bio-mechanic and my knowledge of machinery to recreate him. But he is incomplete, and I am reluctant to finish him. What if he doesn't want to be remade? What if he ends up hating me?





	Error: Reboot Required

“Anything I can assist with?”

I found myself suppressing the want to look up at the voice which was so dear to me, as well as subduing the need to cringe at its emptiness. So keeping my eyes fixed on the mechanisms before me, I answered, “No, thank you.”

I knew that he had bowed customarily before leaving the room, but I saw none of it. Once I was alone again, I let the screwdriver slip from my fingers. Its sharp clang against steel table-top seemed so distant. Everything did. And I blamed myself. I had slowly been dulling myself to reality, so that I might run from mine. But there was nowhere I could run. Not from this.

Hot tears lined the brim of my lower eyelid, and my hands began to tremble. “Dammit,” I breathed, pressing my icy fingertips to my temples. It took as shorter-than-usual amount of time to convince myself that I had to put my work on-hold, just until I could collect myself. Abandoning my workbench, I shuffled over to an out-of-place shelf.

Compared to the cold metal parts and varying tools within my chamber, the contents on this ledge held so much life. There were knickknacks and quirky gifts standing proudly beside photo-frame after photo-frame. I glanced over them all briefly, but my eyes couldn’t help gravitating to one. After a moment of staring at the photograph in consuming silence, I drew it from the shelf to look at it better. It had my face, smiling like I haven’t done in months. And next to my blissful grin was another’s. I traced those features with overwhelming affection, until my fingers were shaking so violently I had to return the picture to its perch.

“Wonshik…”

 ***

That night, I stood within my unattractive sleepwear, against the bedroom window, lost in a daydream. As silently as always, he walked into the room and stood at a distance. “Would you like some tea before bed?” he wondered, his tones as robotic and monotonous as usual.

I dared to look at his reflection within one of the glass planes. He was incomplete: looking part human, part machine. But I knew that I had made everything he was, from his grown skin to his streamline hydraulics. He was a shadow of the man I had based him on.

“Yes, please.” I watched him bow and retreat: feeling like he was taking a part of me with him, which I would never see again. My heart trembled under the pressure of my constricted lungs, but I was more concerned with the task of trying to breathe normally. Every time I saw him, a part of me died. I don’t know if it was my way of trying to bring him back to life, but my weakness was growing by the day.

Giving in to my aching loss, I turned and strode towards the kitchen. There, I stopped in the threshold and watched round-eyed as he went about preparing my beverage. His movements were human enough, but they were not programmed to reflect the mannerisms of the man I had loved. He came to a still, waiting for the kettle to boil. He seemed as stiff as a statue, but I crept forward regardless: scrutinising the basic features I had capture on his half-completed face. When I was almost chest-to-chest with him, I reached up and ran my fingers over his cheekbone – like I had with the photograph previously.

My lips began to tremble. His cybernetic eyes dropped onto me: their lenses adjusting before he cocked his head to the side. “Why are you about to cry?” he wondered.

“I…” I stopped, cupping his face more as I bent under the weight of my agony. “I miss you so much,” I sobbed, finally allowing the tears to spill over. They passed from over the curve of my cheek until finding my jawline, where they hung briefly before dropping to the floor.

“I am here,” he replied.

“I wish you were,” I whispered brokenly, stepping forward and wrapping my arms behind his neck. Embracing his cold metal seemed to snap whatever had kept my true mourning at bay, and I fell apart as I clung to my creation.

 ***

The doorbell rang. It was so out of the blue that I stared at the door - wondering if the sound had been real or not. It was only when he came to a stand beside me, asking, “Should I answer it?” that I realised I had not conjured the chime in my mind.

“No, thank you. Please go make me some breakfast,” I asked politely, pushing up from the couch and strolling towards the door. I waited until he was out of view before I cracked the door open.

“Hyuk?” I blurted, dumbfounded at his smiling face.

“Hey,” he greeted, shifting his weight a little. I couldn’t place if he did it out of excitement or nervousness.

“I, um, I wasn’t expecting you?” I said, trying to ignore my sudden worry. It took a surprising amount of willpower to ignore the reflex to look back at what I wanted to keep hidden.

“You don’t look happy to see me,” he replied, instantly catching me out.

“No. No. It’s just… complicated. Right now. For me.” My ramblings almost brought on a crushing embarrassment.

He blinked thoughtfully. “No one has seen you since we got news of the accident. You’ve locked yourself away for months. We’re worried. I thought I’d come by to see if I could cheer you up, take you out.” He flashed an encouraging look, raising his eyebrows questioningly.

I sighed. “If there’s anyone that will understand, it’s you… Come in.”

I clicked the door shut after him, and found him glancing around. “What?”

“Just wondering if you’ve been cleaning this whole time,” he quipped.

I fake-punched him in the shoulder. “You haven’t seen my lab yet, don’t get your hopes up. But I’ve had help around the house…” He looked at me curiously. “I don’t have to tell you to keep an open mind about it.”

“Not after everything we’ve been through,” he agreed, and followed as I strolled towards the kitchen.

The moment Hyuk saw him, he almost gave a start. “Won-”

“No,” I interrupted. “I call him R4V1. Ravi, to make it easy. But he isn’t… _him_.”

“That’s because you haven’t finished him,” Hyuk replied as-a-matter-of-factly, circling the cyborg who looked like his dead friend.

 


End file.
